


The things you'll leave behind

by wolfsan11



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Garrison Sheith, M/M, Mild Angst, Mild reference to grief, Other, Shiro is a good man, bird POV, pre-kerberos, yeah - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-28
Updated: 2018-02-28
Packaged: 2019-03-25 04:34:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13826583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolfsan11/pseuds/wolfsan11
Summary: Maybe she trusts him. Maybe she just wants the food.Maybe she likes this human. Just a little.Back in the Garrison, long before Kerberos or Voltron or the trauma derived from either, Shiro used to feed a little bird that sat by the window of his dorm.





	The things you'll leave behind

The first time the human tries to touch her, she flees, wings beating as hard as she can push them. Her little heart goes haywire but she’s a fast flier, prides herself on it even. She’s away and safe, sailing into the sky, leaving the ledge and the human far behind.

She’s been warned enough to not trust. She’s seen enough to know better.

She’ll come back later when the human is gone.

 

The second time is when she’s busily pecking at crumbs of food, attention diverted by hunger. The foreign brush of something against her tail has her spinning away in terror, up towards the safety of the skies again where she cannot be chased.

But the human leaves out food every day, without fail.

She can’t help but go back.

 

The human doesn’t try touching her again for a while.

He sits there instead, watching as she eats up the food he leaves. Just watching. It makes her nervous, ready to bolt at the slightest threat of movement. He never does though. He’s careful and slow now, speaking to her in low murmurs, soothing as the calls of her nest mates.

Sometimes his face does an odd thing that looks nice, makes his eyes gleam in a way that doesn’t put her off like it would for other predators.

So she keeps coming back.

 

Weeks later, when the human tries to touch her again, it’s the softest bit of pressure against the tips of her wings.

She doesn’t move, though her whole body trembles with a mix of fear-panic-terror that urges her to leave. She should go. She should _go_. He’ll hurt her.

The human withdraws and sets out more crumbs. The corners of his eyes crinkle.

She stays.

 

The next time he tries to touch her, she does not shy away.

Maybe she trusts him. Maybe she just wants the food.

Maybe she likes this human. Just a little.

 

Somehow, it’s the most normal thing after that. To come flying down once the sun is up, to peck at the strange barrier and wait impatiently for the human to open it for her. To allow him near her, allow him to touch her. Somehow, she finds comfort in the soft brush against her wings and the affectionate scritches to the back of her head. In the sounds he lets loose at her antics, the rumble that reminds her of her mother’s croons and her nest mates’ happy chirps.

Somehow, she finds herself loving this human.

Just a little.

 

Sometimes she can see inside to where the human lives, when the view is not hindered by the whiteness he pulls across when night begins to settle in. She sees him rush in and out from his home, sees him eat and work and do so many things she has no way of understanding.

Sometimes there are others with him.

One other human accompanies him often, and they work and walk and live their way around each other as though entwined. Inseparable.

Perhaps it’s some kind of mating dance.

She’s seen enough of those with other birds, the courtships and the love, but she’s not sure. All she knows is her food and her water and the skies, her old nest and the older birds that chase her away from their ledges when they feel threatened by her presence. Still, it feels intimate.

They’re a pair; she’s certain of it.

 

One day, her human behaves strangely, holding something thin and flat in his hands. He waves it around, talks excitedly to his mate. His face changes as it does when he’s happy, mouth stretched and eyes gleaming. The other human is doing the same and she’s seen enough now to understand.

Something good has happened.

She sees less of him after that, and she wonders what keeps him busy.

Yet, somehow, he never fails to leave food and water out for her, to sing to her and pet her and coo over her in the strange language the humans speak in. And it’s enough to satisfy her. She cannot think to part with this human.

 

The last time he touches her, it’s a gentle scratch to her head with his blunted claws. He says something, a soft mumble of unknown noises, eyes wet in a way she’s not used to.

To her, it sounds like goodbye.

 

She doesn’t see him for the longest time. Her human’s home remains dark, and the ledge remains empty of food. It makes her flutter her feathers in offense, but she keeps returning there, again and again, hoping.

He never comes back.

 

The day she sees brightness in her human’s home again, she goes swooping down excitedly, with only half a mind to peck him in anger for leaving so abruptly.

He’s not there though.

She sees the other human instead, the shorter one with long feathers atop his head. He stands in the middle of the space inside, unmoving. She’s never seen any human be so still.

She pecks at the barrier as she used to. It sounds out a sharp _ping_ that he can’t possibly miss. But when he reacts, it’s not to come feed her or to gently ruffle her tail feathers like her human would have done. She watches him stagger to the place her human used to lay, then to the flat wooden space where her human would take things out and put them on. He opens it up, then stands there and does nothing. Water slips down his face abruptly, confusing her. It’s not raining.

He grabs at the contents within, a predator clawing at prey. His eyes gleam with a harsh intensity, nothing like her human’s eyes had been, and yet there was more there too. A depth she does not know.

He leaves soon after, clutching a life’s worth of memories to himself. And she understands then.

He leaves, not sparing her a glance, taking everything her human had left behind.

Almost everything.

 

He doesn’t come back either.

**Author's Note:**

> My dad likes to feed the pigeons that sit by our kitchen window, and well...here we are? ;;


End file.
